The Three Colors Trilogy is the collective title of three films – a trilogy – directed by Krzysztof Kie〓lowski, two made in French and one primarily in Polish: Trois couleurs: Bleu (Three Colors: Blue) (1993), Trzy kolory: Bia〓y (Three Colors: White) (in French: Blanc) (1994), and Trois couleurs: Rouge (Three Colors: Red) (1994).
Blue, white, and red are the colours of the French flag in left-to-right order, and the story of each film is loosely based on one of the three political ideals in the motto of the French Republic: liberty, equality, fraternity. As with the treatment of the Ten Commandments in The Decalogue, the illustration of these principles is often ambiguous and ironic. As Kie〓lowski noted in an interview with an Oxford University student newspaper, “The words [libert〓, egalit〓, fraternit〓] are French because the money [to fund the films] is French. If the money had been of a different nationality we would have titled the films differently, or they might have had a different cultural connotation. But the films would probably have been the same.”
The trilogy are also interpreted respectively as an anti-tragedy, an anti-comedy, and an anti-romance.